The next time someone whines about how there’s nothing to do in Connecticut, send them our itinerary for this sunny November Saturday. I thrive on these random road trips and, I really do believe, Hoang appreciates them. And Damian? Well… He tolerates them. Around 9:30 in the morning, Hoang asked, “What adventure are we going on today?” I had no such adventure planned, but I happily took up the challenge, printed off a few directions, and we hit the road west.

Enough linkage for you? The drive itself is nice enough, but the various historic and scenic (and delicious) stops along the way made it all the better. This is what we do in our house…Trust me, there’s something cool in every corner of the state.

As invaluable as Google Maps is to my life, I often find it somewhat confounding in that it doesn’t discern between dirt roads, paved roads and rutted goat paths sometimes. This has been an issue for me in the past when driving to trailheads from which to hike. On our drive out to the Rustling Wind Creamery, I plotted the most direct route down a road called Mountain Road. The road connects Norfolk center near the 44/272 intersection with the eastern part of Falls Village in Canaan. See, here’s a map:

As you can see, this road is as remote as you’ll find in Connecticut. As you can’t see, most of it is a single land gravel road – although it is pretty well maintained (at least, perhaps, until it snows). To say the least, it surprised me a bit but Hoang, much to her credit, told me to relax and enjoy the woodland beauty so we spent our time looking for bears and moose – which isn’t as ridiculous as it sounds out here. After about 10 minutes of bumping and weaving, we reached Canaan Mountain Road and headed down to the creamery.

My gosh it’s beautiful out here. I imagine that during peak foliage season, this whole backwoods drive would be unparalleled. A short way down the mountain we reached the Rustling Wind stables and the creamery right next door. We may as well been in the hinterlands of Quebec somewhere; it felt that remote. Although I just read on their website the somewhat laughable, “The Creamery is easily accessible from routes 7, 63, or 44.” You surely don’t have to approach the way we did, but coming up from Route 63 you must climb a gosh darn mountain up a long and winding road. It’s not dangerous, but if you’re one of those wimpy drivers you may want to order their stuff through the mail.

We parked in the empty lot and took Damian over to see the horses. The friendly beasts sniffed his head and even let him pet them on their noses. It was a very Hallmark moment, but we had some locally made cheeses to check out inside. I can state with 100% confidence that as much as he loves animals, Damian prefers cheese to just about anything in the world. (In case you’re interested in the stables, here you are.